Increasing the federal minimum wage from $7.25 per hour to $10.10 per hour will mostly benefit the U.S. Economy. This will be my position in this debate.

Con will argue that raising the federal minimum wage will either have no benefit for anyone or will hurt the U.S. economy.

I will use numerous reliable, reputable sources to show that an increase in the federal minimum wage will grow national GDP by tens of billions of dollars and create hundreds of thousands of jobs. There are also other benefits to raising the minimum which I will demonstrate.

I expect Con to use resources to demonstrate that a raise will either have zero impact or will negatively hurt the U.S. Economy.

First of all, I want to thank my brave opponent lannan13 for taking this debate. I wish him well and I know he will offer me a good challenge. This is, after all, the purpose of these debating engagements.

As I stated inROUND 1, I will be defending the position thatincreasingthe federal minimum wage from $7.25 per hourto$10.10 per hourwill mostly benefit the U.S. economy. It will increase the number of jobs in the United States and is likely to increase the nation's gross domestic product--this according to the congressional budget office's latest projections on such a hypothetical raise [1]--and it will have a mostly positive impact on low wage workers, or those that make minimum wage or less to about 5 times the poverty threshold [1]; to give you an example of what this means, raising the minimum wage to $10.10 per hour would not only directly benefit those making the new minimum wage but it would also benefit a single person family (working) that makes up to $68,825 per year, by putting more money in his pocket--this according to the congressional budget office's estimation [1][2]. And of course larger working families will see even greater monetary rewards [1].

But before we get into that discussion, I'm going to demonstrate in this ROUND why a minimum wage increase is badly needed and why failing to raise it will only continue to hurt the nation's workforce, which has seen the purchasing value of its wages go down over the last 30 years because of inflation [3][4].

Purchasing Power of the Dollar isn't what it used to be

Because of inflation, the vast majority of America's workforce has either seen the purchasing value of its wages stagnate or decrease steadily [3]; low wage earners have seen the value of their wages decrease the most [4]. In comparison, the nation's top 1% of earners saw their incomes rise by 31.4% from 2009 to 2012, comfortably exceeding the 9% inflation rate during that period [5][6]. While the value of earnings of the top 1% of earners outpaces the rate of inflation, the vast majority of working Americans are seeing the value of their wages stagnate (upper-middle class) or decrease (below). Income inequality in the U.S. is now at the highest its ever been since 1928 right before the Great Depression [5]. According to economist/professor Emmanuel Saez at the University of Berkeley, the top 1% of earners in the nation get 22.5% of all pre-tax income while 90% of remaining earners get less than half, 49.6% [5]!

Low-wage earners have the seen the value of their wages decrease the most. For the last 40 years, the federal minimum wage has badly fallen behind inflation in real terms. Studies by the U.S. Labor Department, the Bureau of Economic Analysis, and the Pew Research Center have shown that, accounting for inflation, the current minimum wage of $7.25 is even less than what it was in 1968, when it had a value of $8.56 in 2012 dollars (see graph below) [5][7][8].

The U.S. Labor Department has concluded that today's minimum wage workers are paid even less in real terms because of inflation when compared to their 1968 minimum wage counterparts [8]! In fact, since it was last raised to $7.25 in 2009, the federal minimum wage has lost about 5.8% of its purchasing value due to inflation [7].

In a 2012 study, The Centers for Economic and Policy Research concluded that if the minimum wage had kept pace with inflation since it was first enacted in the 1930s, it would now be at $10.52 an hour [5].

To provide an accurate sense of how badly lagging behind the federal minimum wage now is, in 1968 a full-time minimum wage worker earned about $20,000 per year in today's dollars; today a full-time minimum wage worker earns about $15,000 per year [4]. In 1968 a full-time minimum wage worker earned about half of the average annual income during that period; today a full-time minimum wage worker earns about 37% of the average annual income [4]. A steady decline.

While the price of food, services, goods, and healthcare go up both in terms of cost and inflation, the purchasing power of the federal minimum wage has significantly eroded over the years [3]. While the average price of the McDonald's Big Mac has risen from $2.71 in 2004 to $4.62 in 2014--an increase of 70.1% over 10 years--the federal minimum wage has only increased by $2.10 to its current rate over the same period, or by 41% [9][10]. Over the years these less than adequate minimum wage increases accumulate and they create poverty were previously there wasn't any or where it was less pronounced.

As the graph above shows, when accounting for inflation, the current minimum wage has less purchasing power now than it did in the late 1960s. In order to rectify the reduced value of the minimum wage, it needs to be elevated to at least $10.00 in today's dollar value! Failure to do so will only expand poverty in America and deepen the crisis facing low wage workers.

Raising the Minimum Wage to $10.10 would directly benefit 21.4% of the workforce

Currently 3.8 million workers are paid the nation's minimum wage, but raising the wage to $10.10 would directly benefit 21.4% of the workforce--about 30 million workers--by putting more money in their pocket [5][4].

21.4% of the nation's workforce would now have more money in their pocket; the accumulated losses caused by inflation over the years straining the minimum wage worker would be effectively eliminated! A fierce proponent of this idea, the current President has advocated tying this proposed minimum wage hike to inflation, that way any adverse effects created by inflation are effectively handled [11]. This is an even better idea!

Recognizing the current crisis facing the nation's million of low wager earners, President Obama has already signed an exectuve order raising the minimum wage for federal workers from $7.25 to $10.10 [11]. The rest of the nation should follow this example.

Who directly benefits?

As of 2012, 49% of all minimum wage workers are 25 years old or older (see graphic below); however, in excess of 85.5% of these workers are 20 years old or older (not teenagers) [7]. 55% work full time [4]. But of course many more people making less than $10.10 per hour would see a pay raise.

As I stated earlier, nearly 30 million workers would get a pay raise with the minimum wage increase, 9 million of whom are parents [4]. 57.3% of those who would be effected are women [7]; a low minimum wage is one of the reasons why females continue to make 77 cents per dollar that a man makes [12]. Increasing the minimum to $10.10 would help close that gap by 5% [12].

And increasing the minimum wage is the sensible thing to do. Already 19 U.S. states and the District of Columbia have a higher minimum wage than the federal minimum [7]. Numerous business executives and CEOs are in favor of raising the minimum wage to $10.10. Cosco President and CEO, Craig Jelenik, has come out in favor of this proposal by President Obama, stating "Instead of minimizing wages, we know it’s a lot more profitable in the long term to minimize employee turnover and maximize employee productivity, commitment and loyalty" [5], as have executives of GAP [12]. 85% of small businesses already pay wages higher than the minimum [4].

Conservatives estimates by the congressional budget office (CBO)--a federal agency within the U.S. government that provides economic data to congress--places the total immediate gains of raising the minimum wage to $10.10 at $5 billion for working families that make less than the poverty threshold (live in poverty); their income would increase by about 3% and 900,000 people would be moved above the poverty threshold [1].

The CBO also projects that families making one to three times the poverty threshold would see $12 billion in additional real income; families making three to six times the poverty threshold would see $2 billion in additional real income [1].

Overall, the CBO estimates that the nation's poverty would be reduced and that a total of $2 billion would be immediately added to the U.S economy because of the minimum wage increase [1].

My opponent begins his 2nd round argument that a wage increase will increase jobs, but we can see this is false for many reasons. For instance the wage will increase and the employers will have to either raise prices in order to shelter the burden of the increased wages (which we'll get to this in another Contention) and the second is that we have roughly 500,000 jobs lost due to the cutting of jobs in order for business can still compete with others at low prices. You see that CBO, a source that Pro cites several times actually argues my point. http://www.foxnews.com...) and (http://www.thenation.com...#)

This will also hurt teenagers in the Workforce making employers having to cut down on their hours and/or favoring adults and a older population. Let's take Wisconsin for example when the minimum wage was last raised the unemployment soared from 15.8%-19.8%. (http://www.jsonline.com...) Imagine that on a US wide scale. http://www.youtube.com...

Contention 2: Inflation

Pro argues that we should raise the minimum wage to $10.10 to help the average Joe, but if that's the case why don't we raise the minimum wage to $20 per hour or why not make everyone a millionaire and have them make $million per hour? The answer to this question is a very simple one and it's simply causes prices to increase and inflation to rise. (http://inflationdata.com...)

You see this is a lesson in supply and demand is that when the minimum wage is increased it will cost more for companies to hire and train employees causing more people not to be hired (see video), this results in less jobs, the costs of businesses also rise to keep up with the increased wages and that this ends up causing inflation. (http://www.goupstate.com...)

You see this will be a continuous cycle. If you continue to rise the minimum wage then inflation will fallow causing the minimum wage to rise again and again until we end up with a problem like Zimbabwe. When the minimum wage was risen once more the US saw products prices increase via inflation by a factor of 10. (http://www.nytimes.com...)

Pro source notes. Pro's 1st source (http://cbo.gov...) notes that by 2016 that an increase in minimum wage will cause a loss of 1 million US jobs. Pro please fix your 3rd, 4th, and 6th link for they are broken.

In ROUND 2 my opponent states that projections by the congressional budget office (CBO) for raising the minimum wage to $10.10 indicate that 500,000 jobs will be lost by 2016, when the final increase of the federal minimum wage is to be implemented under one of the President's plans. This is in fact what the CBO is projecting, though the CBO is also projecting an immediate increase of $2 billion to the nation's GDP (with an increase of $19 billion in pre-tax income among low wage earners); the CBO is also projecting that 900,000 people will be lifted above the poverty threshold (out of poverty) [1].

These would be the immediate effects as of 2016, if the President's plan were to be approved by congress and turned into law. The CBO projects an additional $2 billion will be added to the nation's economy, because of such a plan, and that 900,000 will be lifted out of poverty; it also projects that roughly 500,000 jobs will immediately be lost [1]. However, the picture for long-term employment because of this proposed minimum wage hike looks far more positive, as do the financial gains to the economy once the minimum wage hike has been enacted. A study by the Economic Policy Institute shows that raising the federal minimum to $10.10 (in the precise steps offered by the Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2013) would generate $30 billion in new economic activity and lead to the creation of 140,000 new full-time jobs [2]; this is identical to the position of numerous economic research organizations and the White House [9]. Furthermore, to discount my opponent's contention that raising the minimum wage will hurt employment and the economy, numerous studies, including several by the U.S. government's Bureau of Economic Analysis, the Center for Economic and Policy Research, the Universities of California-Berkeley, Massachussetts-Amherst, North Carolina-Chapel Hill, and a survey by the University of Chicago show that raises in the federal minimum wage have in fact positively impacted the economy and have no measurable negative effect on employment [3][4][5][6]; the opposite effect on employment has frequently been true [7][8].

An often-cited 2006 study found that states with a minimum wage above the federal minimum wage had faster retail and small business job growth [8]!

My opponent also claims that a proposed raise in the federal minimum wage will hurt working teenagers, but a two-decade wide study of previous federal minimum wage increases by U.C.-Berkeley have found that this fear is completely unfounded [11].

Now, there is a plethora of data by government agencies, universities, and economic research organizations that show increases to the federal minimum wage have mostly expanded the U.S. economy and GDP, while either not negatively impacting the employment numbers or driving them up because of increased sales and business growth. I will cover the numbers and go over various studies in ROUND 4. This is also well understood in the business community. A 2012 study by MIT professor Zeynop Ton documents how major businesses like Trader Joe's and Costco benefit from higher sales revenue and profits than their low-wage competitors by investing in their employees, which reduces turnover and boost productivity [11]. For example, the starting wage at Trader Joe’s ranges between $40,000 and $60,000 per year, more than twice what many of its competitors offer, and yet the sales revenue per square foot at Trader Joe’s are three times higher than the average U.S. supermarket [11].

As Costco CEO Craig Jelinek has stated: "We pay a starting hourly wage of $11.50 in all states where we do business, and we are still able to keep our overhead costs low. An important reason for the success of [our business model is that] we know it's a lot more profitable in the long term to minimize employee turnover and maximize employee productivity....We support efforts to increase the federal minimum wage" [12].

85% of small businesses are on the same page with Craig Jelinek as they already pay wages higher than the minimum [13].

So why do some business executives, managers and political partisans push to keep the federal minimum wage low? Because some individuals don't care about providing for workers and effectively, honestly managing a business--they care exclusively about personal income, no matter who gets hurts and stuck with the bill they should be paying. And America does pay for this kind of negligence...as we shall see.

Inadequate Increases in the Federal Minimum Wage have Increased Poverty

In the U.S. poverty is measured by whether a household fails to make enough income (or show enough savings) per year to surpass the "poverty threshold" assigned by the U.S government for the number of individuals living in the household [14][15]. Because of inadequate increases in the federal minimum wage with respect to inflation and because employee paychecks have become smaller in real terms for the same reason, poverty in the U.S. has increased over the last three decades [16]. The chart below illustrates the "povery guidelines" used by the Department of Health and Human Services for assigning poverty to a household based on annual income and number of people. Households making less than the income enumerated for the corresponding number of people in them are classified as "living in poverty". The "poverty guidelines" are in actuality simplified versions of the "poverty thresholds" used by the U.S. Census Bureau [15].

Now, from first appearances via this chart a full-time minimum wage earner might appear to not be in poverty, but if his/her family consist of another person not employed and not receiving any type of income (a child perhaps), that would assign this person as "living in poverty", simply because his/her income falls below the poverty guideline for the household number [18].

In 2012 the U.S. Census Bureau announced that more than 16% of the U.S. population lived in poverty, including about 20% of all U.S. children, up from 13.2%--39.8 million people--in 2008 [14]. Since the 1980s, relative poverty in the U.S. has consistently exceeded that of other wealthy nations [14]. In 2011, child poverty reached historically high levels, with 16.7 million children living in food insecure households; in 2013 a UNICEF report ranked the U.S. as having the second highest relative child poverty rates in the developed world [14].

The congressional budget office (CBO)--a source my opponent happily cites--projects that raising the minimum wage to $10.10 will not only add billions of dollars to the economy and provide additional income to low-wage earners, but that it will lift a full 900,000 people out of poverty [1]!

American Tax-payers Subsidize Low-wage Businesses

Furthermore, American tax-payers subsidize low-wage businesses. Many low-wage earners have to rely on public assistance such as food stamps or the earned income tax credit (EITC), because their wages are simply too low. Programs like the EITC are useful protections against poverty, but we shouldn’t let them act as subsidies to low-wage employers, who currently pay lower wages because the American taxpayer will make up the difference [18].

Raising the minimum wage would shrink the federal deficit, since fewer workers would qualify for the EITC [9]. Finally, a recent study by U.C.-Berkeley concluded that raising the minimum wage would allow 3 million people to quit the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) formerly known as food stamps [9].

Okay, I'm going to attempt to hurry up and post my round so I'm sorry if I seemed rushed. I don't think I'll be able to cover everything, but I'll try to get what I can. First I'll address my opponent's points.

Contention 1: Inadequate Increases cause poverty

My opponent here goes on to debate that raising the minimum wage to $10.10 per hour will raise us out of poverty, but let me site one of my opponent's source's to indicate how much of an impact this will make according the the CBO which Pro sources a lot. It reads, about half way down the page, that the likely range of loss of jobs for the $10.10 per hour option would be a loss of 1 million jobs (http://cbo.gov...).

Let's just do some simple math from what Pro has provided us here today. 1 million jobs lost subtracted from the 900,000 that will be lifted from the poverty line and that equals 100,000 people unemployed and living in poverty. Not to mention the other side effects from raising the minimum wage such as loss of jobs for teenagers. The last time Congress raised the minimum wage in July of 2009, 600,000 teen jobs disappeared within 6 months. (http://www.forbes.com...)With the last minimum wage teen unemployment percentages went from 14.8% to 27.1% (http://articles.chicagotribune.com...)

The Inflation will also rise, as Pro fails to refute. But let's look at the minimum wage increase. It's going to go from $7.25 per hour to $10.10 per hour which is over a 25% increase. This will cause prices to rise by 25% again. (http://newsbusters.org...)

Pro continues to bring up the bellow the poverty repetively, but this is false. In fact Forbes has actually found that the minimum wage increase will only effect less than 15% of people below the poverty line. This number is way lower than what Pro had brought up in the previous rounds. (http://www.forbes.com...)

Contention 2: Rise in minimum wage = decreased deficit.

My opponent brings up this point in his last point in his last round, but this is another myth. According to PBS, more people would rise the prices in order to counteract the rising wages (http://www.pbs.org...) My opponent again failed to respond to my argument last round when I brought up inflation and the cycle of prices and wages. The fact that inflation fallows the wage increase would mean that we would surely see barely any change.

My opponent likes to throw around the claim that the congressional budget office (CBO) is projecting adefinite1,000,000 job losses if the federal minimum wage is hiked to $10.10. But this is partisan hyperbole on his part.

The CBO is in fact projecting (with high confidence) that job losses will range from VERY SLIGHT to--WORSE CASE SCENARIO--an increase in unemployment of 1,000,000 [1]. In fact the CBO is projecting "there is about a two-thirds chance that the effect" would be in this range [1]. The CBO's central estimate (which I have circled in the chart below) is that 500,000 workers would lose their job as a result of implementing the minimum wage hike [1]. The office's own numbers indicate that raising the minimum would mostly benefit the US economy and workers, by providing additional billions of dollars and pulling 900,000 people out of poverty [1]! This doesn't include other benefits, like decreasing the number of low wage earners that depend on public assistance such as food stamps and the EITC to get by [2]. As I stated inROUND 3, a recent study by the University of California-Berkeley concluded that raising the minimum wage would allow 3 million people to quit the government assistance program known as SNAP (previously known as food stamps) [2].

Not raising the minimum wage to eliminate the hurtful effects of inflation on the low wage earner would only deepen the economic crisis presently facing them and wouldincreasethe number of people in poverty. As a result, even more people would be forced to rely on public assistance programs as the income gap continues to expand and as inflation gradually increases. Therefore not doing anything for America's low wage earnersisn'tan option! Allowing the minimum wage to lose even more of its purchasing power over time and ignoring the plight of low wage earners will further erode the quality of life that was once commonplace to America's working class [3].

Inflation has many causes, which is why the Federal Minimum Wage should be Indexed to Inflation

My opponent argues that raising the federal minimum wage would be pointless, as inflation would eventually eat the gains caused by increasing the minimum wage. And on this point he is moderately right; however, inflation has many causes, as economists point out, and it's a healthy economic trend in any growing economy--as long as it stays within limits [4]. Inflation is caused when demand for a product or service outstrips supply, which causes prices to go up; it can also be caused when new popular technology is introduced--some brand names demand higher prices; but it can also be caused by the depletion of natural resources, by natural disasters, by an increase in production costs, by the deregulation of banks, by government regulation and taxation, by business monopolies, by the expansion of the money supply, and various other reasons [4]. Inflation is natural and unavoidable in any economy. But too much of it can present problems, which is why the federal government tries to regulate it wherever it can [4]. Increasing wages can also create inflation if a business passes on the wage increase to consumers, but this doesn't always happen [5]. Recently, inflation has caused even pay raises among middle class workers to be fruitless, as the modest pay increases simply aren't enough to deal with the deleterious effects of inflation, especially as the income gap grows between well-to-do employers, who are increasingly keeping more of their profits, and all other wage earners [6][7]. As I demonstrated in ROUND 2, the nation's wealthiest Americans are generating income comfortably exceeding the rate of inflation; the middle class has seen either stagnant wage growth or negative wage growth when accounting for the effect; the lower classes have seen the worse decline in income over this last decade [7]. Raising the federal minimum wage to $10.10 would eliminate the accumulated deleterious effects of inflation over the years for low wage earners; linking (or "indexing") it to inflation would ensure the effects are prevented in the future.

Four states--Florida, Oregon, Washington, Vermont--have already indexed their state minimum wage to inflation, and Minnesota is currently proposing to do so [8]. After raising the state minimum wage and indexing, the state of Washington saw no negative impact on employment some initially feared would be there [10]. The Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2013, introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives, proposed raising the federal minimum wage to $10.10, and then having it adjusted every year to keep pace with the rising cost of living [11]. It is a congressional bill President Obama endorses and continues to endorse [12], particularly in light of the recent executive order he enacted which hiked the federal minimum wage for federal contractors from $7.25 to $10.10 [13].

Pro’s closing remarks

My opponent wants to paint a picture about market forces and national economies that suggest they are capable of remedying themselves, with little to no human meddling--that economies, driven by the human impulses for profit and purchasing, are both natural and effective and require practically no government interference/regulation to do their job well. It is the view that the market forces of supply and demand will correct every temporary economic problem in the end, and that the government has nothing to fear by taking the path of inaction; but this is a wildly naïve view [14]. Nature is notoriously inefficient at what she does. Despite the miraculous breakthroughs achieved over long periods of time, nature is sloppy, destructive, deadly, viral, frequently very, very patient, and consistently correcting previous errors or enacting new ones--this is how nature achieves stability and breakthroughs in the world [15]. For all the success we observe in nature, there exist even more examples of biological dead-ends, mistakes, lousy genetic mutations, and genuine pain that we completely overlook in Earth's history [16]. Take the human body. When provided with adequate fuel (food, water) and exercise it can survive quite well. But there are some conditions where it clearly requires outside (or emergency) aid. When a human gets sick or when he gets injured, he often requires medical assistance to improve; in many cases failure to provide that medical assistance will lead to the humans rapid decline and death. Nature just hasn't equipped humans to do everything on their own. Specialized medical treatment is required to improve the human's life (or to keep him away from death) in many situations. A type-2 diabetes patient, for example, may require medication to control blood sugar levels; otherwise his health can rapidly deteriorate [16].

And so it is with a nation's economy. The US Federal Reserve constantly observes (and if necessary, adjust) the nation's money supply and interest rates to promote sustainable growth, high levels of employment, and stability of prices to preserve the purchasing strength of the US dollar; frequently this requires it to regulate the nation's banks too [17].

In the same spirit it's time for the US government to increase the minimum wage, to restore the purchasing power lost to US workers. A full-time minimum wage earner today takes home wages that are even less than what an equivalent worker took home in the 1960s, because of inflation. The purchasing power of the minimum wage is so low today that American fast food workers receive more than $7 billion in public assistance [18]; in many states, Walmart employees, which are paid the minimum wage starting out, are the largest group of medicaid recipients of any business; they are also the single biggest group of food stamp recipients in the nation, recieving on average $1,000 in public assistance [18].

Let's take a look at this estimate picture once more from Pro's source. It's states that the Likely range is a loss of 1 million workers. If we define likely we can see that likely means having a high probability of occurring or being true : very probable. (http://www.merriam-webster.com...) With that meaning that there is a high probability of it occurring we can see that this is and can be the accepted value in this debate.

Let's do some more math. In last round's math equation I forgot to add in the jobs lost by teens. So if the math is correct and even if we only use Pro's number of 500,000 jobs lost by adults we can see that 600,000+500,000-900,000=200,000 people still in poverty and that's only using Pro's number and if we use the number found in the paragraph above this one one can see that the number would be inflated to 700,000 in poverty and left without a job. (http://www.forbes.com...)

Contention 2: Inflation

Pro begins and states that I am correct, but then turns around to say that I am incorrect, because inflation is unavoidable. However, if inflation is unavoidable then why do we not try to avoid it by not causing it to happen by raising the minimum wage which I have proved in several examples in Round 2 and 3, like Milwaukee and all across the US. Pro does not bring up examples here so I extend my points across the board. (http://articles.chicagotribune.com...) and (http://newsbusters.org...)

In conclusion, one can see that raising the minimum wage will be devistating to the US economy as more people will lose jobs then will actually be moved out of poverty and prices as well as inflation will sky rocket as proven last time. I thank you and please vote Con.

How ridiculous....I may need to actually cast a vote to counter this disaster that is tyler5362's votebomb.

But before I do, let me just commend Contra -- who has long been someone with whom I strongly disagree on a lot of issues -- for putting his own view aside and voting based on merits, and with a very strong rfd to boot. That's how it's done, folks. Tyler5362 could take quite a few lessons from this guy.

Now, I could put out how the notion that the minimum wage "costs jobs" is not "basic economics" and that he wouldn't know even if it were because he knows nothing about so-called basic economics, but I'll leave that one alone.

Con states that the increase in the minimum wage would result in a loss of jobs (which is true; this is basic economics). In order for a business to successfully pay every single one of his employees; he must have enough money to cover paychecks. He/she (The employer) would have to adjust to these circumstances and would, over time, lay off or fire workers in order to be able to cover the bi-weekly/weekly paychecks. Con does a better job in proving this by using his sources' information.

Reasons for voting decision: Pro had a wider array of empirical data to support his arguments, which therefore propelled him to victory. Although I personally dispute many of the contentions he made, I'm a voter and therefore it's not my role to bring up my rebuttals. Pro's arguments about how a minimum wage hike would (supposedly) help the low-income Americans around this nation was compelling.
Con's arguments had good points as well, though they weren't as strong. His theoretical arguments were -- for the most part -- not defeated, but (1) Con didn't ruthlessly utilize them, and (2) data is more compelling than theory alone. Con also didn't refute some of Pro's figures, such as (1) that compensation rates have mostly matched productivity growth after accounting for rising health care costs and other costs of living, (2) that only a minute portion of the workforce (I think less than 5%) actually gets the minimum wage, and that (3) the minimum wage is usually a temporary wage, as workers gain skills.

Reasons for voting decision: Con failed to reference many of the points pro made in his contentions. Inflation rises with any healthy rise in GDP, and the fact that pro presented point to the fact that such a rise in minimum wage would be beneficial.

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